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Larry Sanders could stab the sky and hope for the best. He's got the reach with a 7-foot, 6-inch arm span. He can run fast for a big man, so getting back on defense is no problem.

Instead, Sanders studies the shooter, his angle and his release and positions himself at the best defending angle before he judges the timing of his jump. Nothing is random about his NBA-leading 3.12 blocks per game.

"I try to meet the ball at the backboard," Sanders said, "to anticipate where on the backboard it's going to land. I think it's kind of natural to me."

Trainer Dan Barto believes it is actually a gift. He has worked with Sanders at IMG Academy in Florida for two summers on everything from shooting to weights to nutrition, but when the data came back from the basketball program's visual tests, Barto saw something unique in Sanders.

"He is on the lead end of visual and anticipation skills. He's off the charts on all our vision testing," said Barto. "You can see his eyes racing in talking to him; you can just see the wheels spinning - and those guys are usually the best shot blockers, charge takers and creative scorers because they're not system learners. Everything has to be cognitively envisioned."

In a way, with his gift, shot blocking is almost an art form to Sanders, an emerging 6-foot-11 center-forward for the Milwaukee Bucks. It's another way of expressing his creativity, like his sketches, comic book drawings, or his book.

And yet even he never envisioned this kind of career - not with the start he had in the game.

The awakening

Growing up in Fort Pierce, Fla., Sanders got his height from a 6-7 father and 6-4 grandfather, but he didn't participate in any youth sports. If he found himself on the playground basketball courts, it wasn't for dunking and dribbling. He was a skateboarder.

"I was terrible at basketball," said Sanders. "Like if I went to a court by my house or something? I was usually the first guy picked because I was so tall. And then my team would lose.

"And I would never be picked again."

When Sanders attended private school in ninth grade, there was no basketball team, but that wasn't the focus anyway.

"I was getting in trouble a lot. I would have authority issues with teachers," said Sanders. "I was always getting referred to the office. Private school really changed my life. It was really a big turning point for me. I got stronger in my faith. It kind of pushed me away from all that other stuff."

When he transferred to Port St. Lucie High School for the 10th grade, he introduced himself to coach Kareem Rodriguez. Sanders was 6-6. He had no basketball experience.

"He was the tallest kid on campus," said Rodriguez.

Sanders' natural ability was evident right away: He could really run, catch, had nice shooting form and was coordinated.

"He just didn't know the game, the rules, like three-second violation," said Rodriguez. "If I had a dollar for every time he was called for a lane violation his first year of playing basketball, I'd be very rich right now.

"But he was a natural at shot blocking and I wanted to get him in to the habit of just running the floor, so he could be the first person back on defense to try and block the shot."

Sanders got better and his team also enjoyed success, going to the state semifinals his junior year. But emotionally, Sanders still had an argumentative streak.

"We had some issues, him and I personally, and him and school and him during games," said Rodriguez. "He is a passionate guy. With him, there's a right and a wrong and when he feels wronged, he's going to tell you. He's a great person to have around because he has conviction."

By the time Sanders averaged almost 19 points and 13 rebounds his senior season and Port St. Lucie won a district championship, he had already committed to Virginia Commonwealth and had no interest in being courted by the bigger so-called basketball schools.

The big step

The VCU campus swirled with student demonstrations over the Middle East, scents of various ethnic foods sold on corners, artists peddling their creations - and then there was this basketball team with a collective goal.

"Those guys were all close, like brothers, and when they practiced, they fought like dogs, noses bleeding," said Sanders. "But once it was over they were back to being brothers. I loved that."

He wanted to study art but it conflicted with basketball, so he began concentrating on religious studies and eventually settled on a major in sociology.

Sanders made his biggest leap of improvement in basketball between his freshman and sophomore years when his average numbers jumped from 4.9 points and 5.2 rebounds to 11.3 points and 8.6 rebounds. Coach Anthony Grant "locked me in the gym that summer" and the two went to work. Even when Grant took a job at Alabama, Sanders was in luck. Shaka Smart took over the VCU program and kept grooming him.

Sanders was a Colonial Athletic Association two-time defensive player of the year. He decided to forgo his senior season and enter the NBA draft just six years after Rodriguez began teaching him the rules of the game.

The Bucks drafted Sanders in the first round in 2010, 15th overall, and his rookie year was promising even if the statistics were small: He averaged 4.3 points and 3 rebounds.

Then the lockout after his rookie year derailed his progress.

"I just didn't have pro habits. I didn't know how to be a pro without being in the gym, required to be here," said Sanders. "I didn't know exactly what I should do. I took a lot of steps back and it showed my second year. I wasn't as sharp. I had some issues in training camp with my body. I was in shape, I was running every day, but my muscles weren't ready to take the impact. That just affected my year."

The dip looked like this: 52 games, starting none, with an average of 3.6 points and 3.1 rebounds. His free throw shooting (47.4%) was only slightly better than his field goal accuracy (45.7%). The one good number? Seventy-six blocked shots.

Sanders' jump this year has been a bright spot for an improved 23-19 Bucks team that wasn't awarded any all-stars. After embracing a role off the bench and then accepting that he needed to start, his playing time and all his other statistics are up: 8.5 points, 8.5 rebounds.

There are two reasons for this: Sanders' life settled down, so he could focus on basketball. He got married this off-season and lives with his wife, 2-year-old son and his mom in a suburb of Milwaukee.

Florida sanctuary

He also went to Bradenton, Fla., last summer again to train at IMG for six weeks, six days a week. Days were filled with workouts. Free time at night was a head-clearing run - his hobby anytime - on the beaches of Florida's west coast.

"It was kind of my sanctuary," said Sanders. "I'm thankful for last summer. I had a chance to be settled and knew when we were going to come back, I was really able to focus on just getting better - instead of, where am I going to live? Or am I going overseas? Or what am I going to do with my family?"

At IMG, Sanders worked carefully on form and technique that he maybe couldn't during the season. He also understood that he had to speak up if he needed the extra work during the season.

"He needs repetition where he can kind of work himself through mistakes," said Barto. "Coaches don't always have the most patience with rookies. I think it was important that he finally said: I'm still a young player."

Here's an example:

On his shots, Sanders would jump, turn his hips hard left and then he would drop his left hand fast, which would put a negative force on the ball and lead to very bad misses.

Barto, the Pro Development Coordinator at IMG Academy, worked with Sanders on correcting this - in stages. He started with 30 shots only meant to keep his hips square and landing straight.

"We didn't even care if the ball hit the rim," said Barto. "It was, can you control your hips."

The next 30 shots were about keeping the left arm and shoulder up two seconds longer than before.

"He was actually counting out loud how long he was holding up that left hand in the air," said Barto. "You know a lot of times in professional organizations, they don't have the time to really do that. They have to move on to the next game."

After a while, Sanders went from being unaware of these glitches in his form to self-correcting them.

"I didn't have to keep saying, 'Keep you hips straight,' " said Barto.

Maintaining composure

What Sanders is working on now is keeping his cool. He'll draw a technical pretty quickly. He served suspensions in the past, two last April and one in October, after he got in to a heated confrontation with an unidentified teammate. Sanders felt his value to the team was being challenged, or disrespected, and he felt the need to stand up for himself.

"It shouldn't have gotten where it did - but it helps now," said the 24-year-old Sanders. "I see it a lot, teammates have disagreements. When those things are handled in the beginning of the season? Usually things are good. But when they are handed at the end of the season, things are lingering and fester. This was something that had to be kind of handled.

"I consider myself as a leader in a lot of ways. And at that point I had to kind of establish my respect. It was only so that my word could kind of be heard a little bit more. At that point I was kind of cast down a little bit because I was young, And so that was what that disagreement was about. It made us better teammates. Me and that guy are closer now and I feel like the team is closer now."

Sanders calls his passionate personality his "biggest strength and biggest weakness." He does try to chill out. That's why he doesn't listen to crazy music in pregame to get himself jacked up.

"It's gospel music," Sanders said with a laugh, "because I have to find my peaceful place."

Art is another place Sanders finds peace.

Sanders unwinds when he's drawing portraits or when he's writing. He's started a fiction novel and sometimes wakes in the middle of the night to write down the next scene. He appears in the just-released movie, "Movie 43," in which he has a few lines as a 1970s-era basketball player (his tattoos were spray-painted over).

He also may be the only 6-11 man on the planet who feels comfortable on a skateboard. He custom-designs them, hand-picking wheels, screws and the truck, and then artfully arranging the grip tape across the plank in his own design.

"I learned how to skate before I learned how to play basketball," said Sanders. "I can hang them up and use it like canvas, like art.

"I love my job, the team, fighting for something, competing against another team. I love to play but it doesn't consume me. Some people fall in love with the basketball, and what they can do with it - but it's a team sport. I love the team aspect of it.

"I like to stay creative. Creativity is the only thing you own. You don't really own anything in this world but what you create. And our imagination is just endless."

When the Knicks’ Tyson Chandler crouched for the tipoff of Friday night’s game against the Milwaukee Bucks, he did not realize that he was matching up at midcourt against a version of his former self, in the opposing center Larry Sanders.

“I honestly haven’t watched that much on him,” Chandler said before the game.

Eight minutes in, Sanders made his presence known. Iman Shumpert pulled up for 12-foot jumper, but Sanders slapped it into the third row for his 130th block of the season, the most of any player in the N.B.A. Sanders looked into the seats, raised his hand to his forehead and squinted his eyes as if trying to find a shooting star in outer space. He blocked a shot by Carmelo Anthony in the third quarter.

The 6-foot-11 Sanders has sneaked up on the league — as he has on guards looking for layups but instead finding his open frying pan of a hand — as the best shot-blocker and the leading candidate for the Most Improved Player award.

Sanders put up uninspiring statistics his first two seasons, but his averages per game of minutes, points, rebounds and blocks have all more than doubled this season.

He leads the league with 3.0 blocks per game, while playing just 25 minutes a night. In the last two months, he has tied a record that was held by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, shown flashes of vintage Bill Russell and, as the Knicks saw in their 96-86 victory Friday night, been transformed into a near replica of Chandler.

Teams that excel at stymieing the pick-and-roll rely on long, athletic big men who can quickly challenge guards on the perimeter and then rush back to protect the basket. Chandler often acts as the Knicks’ sole defensive threat because of his exceptional court coverage, and Sanders anchors a Bucks team that is seventh over all in the Eastern Conference standings with the same skill set.

“You realize how good he is in the games he misses,” Bucks forward Drew Gooden said. “You don’t have somebody to scare guys from going for layups.”

On offense, Sanders, like Chandler, had to end his love affair with low-percentage shots 16 to 23 feet from the basket and focus on closer opportunities. Chandler is now routinely chasing records for the highest field-goal percentages in N.B.A. history. This season, Sanders is taking two-thirds of his shots at the rim and maintaining a field-goal accuracy around 53 percent.

Years ago, it would not have been possible to compare Chandler and Sanders as players. Chandler, now 30, was profiled by “60 Minutes” as a ninth grader for his surefire future as an N.B.A. center; Sanders, who is 24, had never played organized basketball until he was 16. At the behest of coaches who were intrigued by his height, Sanders joined the team at Port St. Lucie High School in Florida as a sophomore. In his first game, he put the ball in the wrong basket.

But he eventually developed into a star because of his aggressive athleticism and became a two-time conference defensive player of the year at Virginia Commonwealth University. In 2010, the Bucks drafted Sanders with the 15th pick.

Sanders was a meager scorer and prolific fouler his first two seasons. But he spent last summer training at the IMG Academy in Bradenton, Fla., and figured out how to position himself better and time blocks.

“Everything slowed down,” Sanders said. When opponents go for layups, Sanders can now envision the spot on the backboard near where his hand will meet the basketball.

When he last played the Knicks on Nov. 28, poor shooting and quick fouls limited his playing time. He then responded with the best three-game stretch of his career, compiling 22 blocks. On Nov. 30, he logged 10 blocks as part of a triple-double — coming off the bench — against the Timberwolves, tying Abdul-Jabbar’s franchise record for blocks in a game. On Dec. 1, Sanders had 18 points, 16 rebounds and 5 blocks against the Celtics, a performance that, had he donned the opposing uniform, could have brought on a Russell déjà vu.

The Bucks played in New Orleans two nights later, and Celtics Coach Doc Rivers warned his son Austin, a rookie shooting guard for the Hornets, to stay away from Sanders. Austin did not listen. Sanders swatted Austin’s first two attempts in a span of three minutes, foreshadowing some final statistics: Sanders totaled seven blocks and Austin shot 0 for 5.

Banging bodies in the post, Chandler and Sanders got more familiar with each other on Friday night, but unknown to them was their shared passion for art. In September, Chandler held an exhibition that showcased his photographs of New York, London and Tanzania. Sanders posts his penned portraits on the Web, designs skateboards, appears in the film “Movie 43” and is writing a novel.

Sanders said he would like to collaborate with Chandler on a project. For now, they share the art of intimidating defense.

Great forum, great articles, great year for "Larry ****en sanders". I have him as the most improved player right now, and he's hovering around an all-nba defense nod for me. Haha not that I'm biased or anything....

I think my one complaint with him yet is that he still needs to learn when not to go for the block. I don't remember the exact circumstance, but I was at the Orlando game, and he tried to jump over like 3 guys to block a shot from the weak side. He didn't get anywhere close to blocking it, but the shot was still fairly well contested by someone else (I think it was Ersan guarding the guy). It was a tough shot even without Sanders trying to block it, and it missed off the weak side. Larry's guy was there without anyone around him for the easy put back.

I love Larry and he's very exciting to watch, but if he can master when to go for the block and when to hang back and let his teammates do the work, he'll be a monster.

I think my one complaint with him yet is that he still needs to learn when not to go for the block. I don't remember the exact circumstance, but I was at the Orlando game, and he tried to jump over like 3 guys to block a shot from the weak side. He didn't get anywhere close to blocking it, but the shot was still fairly well contested by someone else (I think it was Ersan guarding the guy). It was a tough shot even without Sanders trying to block it, and it missed off the weak side. Larry's guy was there without anyone around him for the easy put back.

I love Larry and he's very exciting to watch, but if he can master when to go for the block and when to hang back and let his teammates do the work, he'll be a monster.

Yeah Larry needs to get a little smarter about staying home defensively, and he needs to get a little stronger. Those two things are going to be the big difference between being a great shot blocker and rebounder or being a great defender.

Bucks center Larry Sanders tried to stand in the way of onrushing Kenneth Faried, a dunking machine they call the "Manimal" in Denver.

Sanders picked up a foul and stayed flat on the floor before being helped to the locker room by two teammates.

Initial X-rays of Sanders' right hip area did not show any damage but the 6-foot-11 player was to undergo additional evaluations on Wednesday. Sanders was at his locker after the Bucks' 112-104 loss to Denver and traveled with the team to Salt Lake City, where Milwaukee will play Utah on Wednesday night.

Concerned teammates congregated around Sanders near the foul line after he fell to the floor with 4 minutes 41 seconds remaining and the Bucks leading, 100-97.

He already had added to his league-leading blocks total with five more rejections against the Nuggets.

"I landed more to the right side, on the back of the hip bone," Sanders said. "They did a couple X-rays. Nothing too severe. That's great news.

"it's pretty painful. I'll just get a couple more X-rays and take care of it so I can get back as fast as I can."

Faried finished with 13 points and 10 rebounds and played a part in Denver's comeback as it outscored the Bucks, 33-18, in the fourth quarter.

"We collided in the air and I couldn't catch myself," Sanders said. "Once you're in the air like that it's any man's game. And me jumping straight up and him coming full speed, usually you're on the losing end of that

"He didn't make the shot, did he? OK, good."

Faried did not make the dunk but hit 1 of 2 free throws as part of Denver's 19-4 run to end the game.

Faried said he and Sanders had talked about a meeting at the rim a few plays earlier.

"He grabbed my arm," Faried said. "He knew he did. We were talking about the play. He told me I was bouncy and I told him, 'Watch out now.'

"It was ironic and funny because I came down and tried to dunk it, and we were talking about it two possessions earlier when we were shooting free throws."

what do you guys think about locking him up this off season to try to maybe lock him up 4-5 years without having to give him the max hopefully...i think if he does this next season he will be a lock to get a max i think if we could maybe get him to sign now we could get him cheaper albeit a risky move because who knows if he'll just fall off and this is a 1 year thing but IMHO i dont think it is he should always be a good rebounder and a great shot blocker as long as he dont lose any athleticism....risky move but i think it would be worth it i think the only way he can go is up from here on out!

Bucks center Larry Sanders will miss his second consecutive game Monday with a bruised lower back and will seek a second medical opinion in the coming days.

Sanders said prior to Monday's game against Washington that his back has not progressed the way he had expected it to, six days after suffering a scary fall in Denver.

"I'm not feeling that much better," Sanders said. "So, we'll see. It's really deep though, so I'm going to get another opinion. I've never had one that really bothered me like this before."

Bucks coach Jim Boylan wouldn't rule Sanders out for the final game before the All-Star break, but the fact he's seeking a second opinion leaves his status in doubt for Wednesday's game against Philadelphia.

Boylan confirmed the team is making arrangements for Sanders to go see somebody and have another set of eyes evaluate the injury.

After suffering the injury trying to draw a charge in the fourth quarter of Tuesday's loss to Denver, Sanders underwent a bone scan Wednesday in Salt Lake City that came back negative for any fracture.

Samuel Dalembert — who has double-doubles in three straight games — will start again in place of Sanders.

The NBA's leader in blocked shots, Sanders has come into his own protecting the rim this season and the Bucks have badly missed his defensive ability in the three games he's missed in the last two weeks due to illness and injury.

Milwaukee is 1-3 without Sanders this season, winning Dec. 12 against Sacramento but dropping all three games he's missed in the last two weeks.

"It's tough right now with just Sam out there and Ekpe's coming in for him," Boylan said. "We miss Larry in the rotation. We don't want to put too many minutes on Sam, I don't think he's quite ready for that yet.

"Not having Larry around forces us to push him a little bit, not afraid to do that but at the same time I'd rather have the luxury of not doing that."

After being away from the team to tend to a personal matter, Bucks reserve forward Marquis Daniels is back with the team and will be active for Monday's game.

I wouldn't be shocked at Sanders getting a max offer. Hibbert got one from Portland. All it takes is one team. So 2 years we needs to have plenty of cap space. Believe were at $19M before any options and any new signings. Probably why were not interested in a max deal with Jennings. PG's are a dime a dozen these days.

The Bucks returned from the four-day all-star break on Monday and immediately found some good news.

Starting center Larry Sanders was back on the practice court for the first time since suffering a bruised lower back in a game against Denver on Feb. 5. Sanders was able to take part in the entire practice and pegged his chances at a return against Brooklyn Tuesday night at "70-30."

The Bucks play the Nets at the Barclays Center on Tuesday and face them again Wednesday night at home. Milwaukee, currently eighth in the Eastern Conference race, is starting a push to secure a playoff spot over the final 31 games.

"I wouldn't guarantee it but I'd probably say a 70-30 chance," Sanders said of playing Tuesday.

Sanders said he benefited greatly from the break and came to the Bucks' facility for treatment and was able to work on some shots whie continuing to recuperate.

The Bucks went 1-3 in the four-game stretch without Sanders, including home losses to Detroit and Washington.

"With this team I put the defense on my shoulders," Sanders said. "I want to be a leader on the defensive end. I think that helps us out a lot.

"I think they missed it a little bit. But they worked through it, especially that Philly game, and showed we have that in us. But I'm ready to return. I'm ready to lock that paint down and get this ball back rolling."

Samuel Dalembert contributed in Sanders' absence and worked into better playing shape. So now the Bucks should have a more effective center tandem with both players available.

"It will be good to have Sam in better condition so he's more productive for longer stretches," Bucks coach Jim Boylan said. "Bringing Larry back gives us two guys we can be productive with around the basket, can block shots, can change the game for us."